ABSTRACT
Despite the major changes in the world balance of power and the rapid growth of the major imperialisms through colonial expansion in the period 1850–1914, Italian foreign policy remained entirely Eurocentric during the first 30 years of the existence of the unified state. From Cavour to Crispi, ‘legal’ Italy asserted itself outside Europe only in token fashion and as a hanger-on of the major colonising powers, as when Cavour offered in 1861 to join in the suppression of the Chinese peasant revolt known as the ‘Boxer Rebellion’. Although the sinistra storica tried unsuccessfully to condition the expansion of French control into Tunisia and Morocco, and gratefully accepted a minor supporting rôle in the British hegemony over Egypt, Sudan and East Africa, ‘real’ Italy’s presence in the outside world was much more effectively established by the rising tide of permanent emigrants to New World destinations, who on the whole tended to develop a far more deeply felt patriotism towards their new nations than to their country of origin.
